Development is a lot of fun and it doesn’t take much to get started. If you’re tempted to join the team, don’t hesitate to follow our development on http://github.com/linuxmint and come and chat with the developers at #linuxmint-dev (irc.spotchat.org).

This month we’re giving you a preview of some of the new features we implemented in the LMDE installer.

The timezone selection is now graphical and features a World map:

The keyboard selection now also features a graphical representation of the selected keyboard layout:

On the “User info” screen, you can now select a picture for your user which is then used in the login screen and the lock screen. If your computer has a webcam you can also click the “Take a photo” button and take a picture of yourself.

The installer also features improvements from Schoelje and Bluematt:

UI improvements

A slideshow

Support for manual partitioning and installing on multiple disks

Supporting webcams, calculating lattitude/longitude and map projections and rendering complex graphics was particularly challenging. We were able to find inspiration and bits of code in other installers such as Ubiquity or on websites like StackOverflow. The development of these features was extremely exciting

Other than the new installer, LMDE also received the new DDM (written by Schoelje) and a Plymouth splash screen.

News and summary:

Many thanks to our sponsors, partners and donors. As always we received a fantastic amount of support from you! Donations are traditionally high after a main release and Linux Mint 14 was very popular. This month’s donations were at an all-time high. You’ve never supported us that much before, so I’d like to send all donors a big thank you here!

The new LMDE ISOs are almost ready and they should enter QA sometime this week. As previously announced, LMDE will come in two separate editions for MATE and Cinnamon.

The team is almost entirely focused on the development of Linux Mint 15. The roadmap is ambitious but everything is going really well so far. We’ve got a lot of improvements to show and we can’t wait to share our excitement and to show you what we’re working on. You can follow some of it on Github or stay tuned for the next “Monthly Stats” where we’ll starting previewing some of it.

Although this post comes late in the month, we’d like to wish everyone a Happy New Year 2013. We’ve had a fantastic time working on this distribution and interacting with such a great community since 2006. Of course we all knew from the beginning the Mayans were wrong (right?), so here’s to another year of fun and excitement, our best wishes to all of you and our thanks for using Linux Mint. Happy new year everyone!